Petr Kartashov

Today, “testing” goes beyond application functionality. Yes, a good user experience is highly important, but no matter how engaging your application is, there’s no guarantee that it will work perfectly across all user scenarios. Rigorous testing must take place to identify when and how product quality can be improved. As the list of testing variables continues to grow in length and complexity, it’s critical to take a no-stone-unturned approach to testing. So, how can rigorous testing enhance the quality, delivery, and business value of an application?

It reduces unpredictability

You can’t expect to increase efficiency if you don’t anticipate where things could go wrong. Understanding when and where to test can help to mitigate future breakdowns. The platform, device, user experience, location, connectivity, carrier, network, and security requirements are just a handful of the many variables that can create a particular user scenario. Testing individually for these variables as well as for combinations of them will ensure smooth operating in the future.

It simplifies continuous delivery

Continuous delivery is one of the essential components of testing automation; however, it requires that the delivery lifecycle become an automated process that can be scaled. Effective real-life scenario testing facilitates better programing and ultimately finer-tuning according to user context. And the better the programming, the faster you can gather real-time information and make real-time improvements and enhancements.

It increases brand value

As a consumer, you don’t necessarily notice when a user experience is great, because you expect it to be as seamless as possible. However, you certainly take notice when something goes wrong. Customers directly benefit from error-free digital experiences and are more likely to return to an application when they have had a positive experience. Preemptive, rigorous testing ensures that end users in any given scenario will have a similarly positive experience.

In order to respond to modern digital challenges, testing should go beyond the Agile “shift-left” testing methodology. In fact, the testers of tomorrow should test the business itself, covering its full operational chain and ensuring its viability and reliability under variety of real world conditions and unique client circumstances. The reality is that achieving such a level of test coverage through fast-paced product cadence is nearly impossible without highly scalable automated testing and leveraging of cloud solutions.